


Mad World

by Eliizabethx



Series: Once Upon A Descendant [5]
Category: Descendants (Disney Movies), Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: 1x17, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - August Stayed, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Graham Lived, August Is Freaking Out, Gen, Graham Is Good At Pretending To Be Calm, Huntsman | Sheriff Graham Lives, Jefferson Makes Bad First Impressions, POV Alternating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:28:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25978999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eliizabethx/pseuds/Eliizabethx
Summary: Rewrite of 1x17.AKA the one where Jefferson kidnaps Emma and Mary Margaret, but Graham is still alive so he and August are actually concerned about that fact.
Relationships: Huntsman | Sheriff Graham & Emma Swan, Huntsman | Sheriff Graham & Snow White | Mary Margaret Blanchard, Pinocchio | August Booth & Emma Swan, Pinocchio | August Booth & Huntsman | Sheriff Graham, Snow White | Mary Margaret Blanchard & Emma Swan
Series: Once Upon A Descendant [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1884943
Comments: 6
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

“Sheriff,” August greets. “So what did you need me down here for?”

“It’s about Emma,” he says with a grimace. “I think she’s missing.”

“ _What?!”_

~

She wakes up gagged and bound on the couch, her head still cloudy from whatever the fuck ‘Jefferson’ drugged her with, but she forces herself to focus through it.

Her jacket, keys and gun are gone, and she left her phone in the car, but he doesn’t seem to have harmed her other than the drugged tea.

She glances down and sees her teacup still lying on the ground. Glancing around she quickly shoves one of the pillows off the couch, nudging it over the teacup with her feet and then stomping down on it.

She slides on to the floor and carefully grabs one of the broken shards, using it to saw through the tape around her wrists, quickly taking out her gag and freeing her ankles.

She tries to open each of the windows next, but they all seem to be either painted shut or solid panes. There’s a telescope at one of the windows that points over the trees and looks directly into the Sheriff’s station where she can see Graham and August talking.

_Creepy,_ she thinks. _I don’t think he abducted me for the hell of it then._

She can hear a strange, rhythmic scraping sound from nearby as she quietly approaches the door.

She gingerly turns the knob, inching the door open as slowly as possible until she can peek through it.

The scraping sound gets louder when it’s open and she immediately spots Jefferson across the hall in another room, sharpening a pair of large scissors. She swallows nervously and then carefully slips through the crack in the door, making sure to block the light trying to spill into the hall with her body until she can shut the door behind her.

She creeps down the hall as the sharpening noise continues, heading straight for the stairs as she tries to remember the way out of the house.

One of the floorboards creaks and she curses in her head, quickly slipping inside of a different door in the hall. She starts to peek through the crack into the hall when a muffled voice calls her name, and she whips around to see Mary Margaret tied to a chair.

“ _What is going on?_ ” She mumbles to herself, pulling the gag from the woman’s mouth.

“Emma, thank god,” she whispers, her face wet with tears.

“What are you doing here?” Emma asks, crouching down to untie her ankles. “How did you get out of the cell?”

“Someone left a key under my pillow. God, it was so stupid, but I panicked and just ran. I was in the woods, and this man appeared out of nowhere and grabbed me.” The woman sounds scared out of her mind. “Why are you here?”

“I was trying to find you,” she whispers, helping her up and then gesturing for her to follow.

She carefully checks the hall before beckoning Mary Margaret forward. She notes that the scraping has stopped and keeps her eyes trained on the doorway down the hall as they leave the room.

The sound of a gun cocking makes them freeze and she curses herself again as they turn to find Jefferson leaning against the wall by the stairs, pointing _her_ gun at them.

“Ah, I see you found your friend,” he comments lightly, a sarcastic looking smile on his face.

“I’ve already called for backup,” she says quickly, placing herself in front of Mary Margaret. “They’ll be here any minute.”

“You haven’t called anybody,” he says confidently, his smile widening in amusement. “I know because you don’t have a phone, and neither do I. Now go tie her back up, and we can have a little conversation.”

She reluctantly complies, fury easily pushing down any fear she feels as she sees the scared, hopeless look in Marry Margaret’s eyes.

“Emma,” she whispers.

“Shh, it’s gonna be okay,” she promises, nodding reassuringly as she replaces the gag.

She addresses him as she stands back up, staying at Mary Margaret’s side while he leans in the doorway.

“The telescope,” she prompts, watching him step into the room. “You’ve been watching me. Why?”

From the corner of her eyes she sees Mary Margaret’s head swivel in her direction, her eyes wide with alarm.

He smiles ambiguously, grasping her elbow and leading her from the room. “I need you to do something for me.”

Mary Margaret’s muffled shouting follows them out, and Emma feels emotions she can’t afford to acknowledge right now try and clog her throat as Mary Margaret demands he not hurt her.

He leads her to a different room than the one she woke up in, shoving her through the door and firmly closing it behind them.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but if you hurt my friend, I _swear_ I’ll make you regret it,” she threatens, stepping into his personal space heedless of the gun.

“Hurt her?” He repeats, stepping closer and forcing her to back up to keep him from touching her. “Why would I do that? I’m practically saving her life.”

“How do you figure?”

“Well, Regina obviously has it out for her,” he says, still smiling vaguely, sounding like he’s indulging her questions like you would a child’s. “Everyone’s already cursed, and she’s _still_ causing trouble for your friend. She must _really_ hate her.”

She feels like someone just poured ice over her head as she freezes.

“What curse?” She asks, wondering if he’s been watching Henry too, or if he’s just heard him talking about it.

“Don’t play stupid,” he says, his smirk going a little mischievous. “The one keeping us all trapped here… All of us except for _you_.”

“Have you been watching Henry?” She can’t help but ask.

“Henry? The Queen’s father?” He asks, looking genuinely confused.

“Henry, the Mayor’s kid.”

“Oh, _Henry!”_ He says, smiling widely again. “Your Henry, and his book of stories. The ones you choose to ignore.”

“Why have you been spying on me?” She demands, reluctantly listening to his vaguely philosophical spiel, sounding like a strung-out psychopath.

“You see, I know what you refuse to acknowledge, Emma,” he says, his expression going a little conflicted. “You’re special. You brought something precious to Storybrooke - magic.”

“You’re insane,” she says quietly, he looks genuinely disappointed.

“Why? Because I’m telling you the truth?”

“Because you’re talking about _magic_.”

“Open your eyes! Look around Emma, you _know_ things aren’t right here. Wake up.”

“What do you want?” She asks, not wanting to listen to more of his ramblings.

“I want you to make it _work_ ,” he hisses, harshly grabbing her shoulder and forcing her down into a chair.

“You want me to make _what_ work?” She asks, even as she stares at the tophat sitting on the table in front of her.

He leans his head against hers, staring at the hat over her shoulder and she stays still as his arms rest on the back of the chair.

“You’re the only one who can do this,” he says. “You’re gonna make it work.”

She stares at the tools on the table as he rummages in a drawer, pulling materials out and dropping them in front of her.

“Make one like that,” he says, pointing to the hat.

“You don’t have enough?” She can’t help but sass.

“Well none of them work, do they?” He snarks back, dropping into the chair on the other side of the table.

“Wait,” she says, suddenly making the connection as she looks around the room. “The hats, the tea... your psychotic behavior. You think you’re the Mad Hatter.”

“... My name is Jefferson,” he says quietly, staring down at the table.

“Okay, look, you’ve clearly glommed on to my kid’s thing, but they’re just _stories_ ,” she says.

“ _Stories,_ ” he quotes sarcastically. “You know what the problem is with this world? Everyone wants a magical solution to their problems, yet everyone refuses to believe in magic. Do you think that makes sense?”

“Jefferson,” she says, watching him close his eyes in exasperation. “This is it. This is the real world.”

“ _A_ real world,” he corrects passionately. “How arrogant are you that you think yours is the only one? There are _infinite_ worlds, all brushing up against one another. Some have magic and some don’t. Some _need_ magic, like this one. Now, you and your friend aren’t leaving here until you get my hat to work, until you make it work.”

He points the scissors he’d been sharpening earlier at her, before tossing them on to the table in front of her. She picks them up and starts cutting the fabric, staring at him through her eyelashes.

“And then what?”

“And then I go home,” he says quietly, something longing in his eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

"What the hell do you mean, you 'think she might be missing'?!" He demanded.

“Emma came in early, but when I got here Mary Margaret’s cell was wide open and I haven’t been able to reach Emma,” Graham says, a serious look on his face.

“Don’t tell me you think she’s helping Mary Margaret escape?” August says, staring at the Sheriff aghast.

“No, I don’t,” he assures. “Emma would never do something that risked her place in Henry’s life, and she’d know running would just make things worse for Mary Margaret.”

“So someone took them,” he concludes, staring down at Emma’s desk with a frown. “Who the fuck would take them?”

“That’s what we need to find out.”

“What are we going to do?” He asks, itching to do something, _anything_.

“We have to be careful about this,” Graham advises. “Emma and I believe there’s more to Katherine’s disappearance and Mary Margaret’s subsequent arrest, something just doesn’t add up but fuck if I can figure out what. If it gets out that Mary Margaret is missing - escaped or not-”

“She’ll practically be convicting herself, and Emma will probably be charged for aiding and abetting her,” August finishes for him, nodding anxiously. “You’re right, we have to keep this quiet… We need to find them as quickly as possible.”

“Which is going to be difficult for just two people,” Graham says with a scowl, pulling a map out of one of the desk drawers and spreading it out over the top of it. “It’s a small town, but the forests surrounding Storybrooke go pretty far and they’re incredibly dense on top of it. Someone smart wouldn’t keep two people somewhere in town, not when one of them was just arrested, but if it’s just one person they’d have a hard time getting two people into the woods.”

"Especially when one of them is Emma,” he mutters, scanning the map and Graham snorts a little at the comment.

“Exactly,” he agrees. “I think we should start by checking the roads along here, they run almost parallel with the forests. It’s the quickest route away from the station that isn’t through town, and there are some old houses scattered around the area too.”

~

“I can’t make it work, what you want is impossible!” She says, throwing the hat he’d had her copying on to the table and standing up in frustration.

“No!” He yells. “It has to be! If it’s not, I’m never going home. I’ll be trapped in this house forever.”

“What is so _cursed_ about your life? Look at this place, it’s beautiful! Doesn’t seem very cursed to me!” She insists, gesturing around the room.

“It’s cursed because like everyone else here, what I love most has been _ripped_ away from me,” he says passionately, his eyes going glassy as he gestures to the telescope by the window. “Look for yourself.”

She slowly approaches, reluctant to take her eyes off him but looking through it anyway. She can see a kitchen where a couple is serving dinner, a young girl appearing with plates and silverware.

“Her name is Grace. Here it’s Paige, but it’s really Grace. _My Grace_ ,” he says thickly, tears visible in his eyes. “Do you have any idea what it’s like, to watch her day in and day out, with a new family- a new father.”

“You think she’s your daughter?” She realizes, jumping when his hand suddenly raises by the side of her face.

“I don’t _think_ , I _know_. I remember,” he whispers. “She has no idea who I am, our life together. But I do… that’s my curse.”

“To remember.”

“What good is this house? All these things, if I can’t share them with her?” He asks, sitting on the corner of the table as a tear slips down his cheek.

“If you really think she’s your daughter, why don’t you reach out to her? Why don’t you tell her?” She asks, stepping in front of him again.

“And destroy her reality?” He demands, standing back up. “I’m _trapped_ by knowledge. How cruel do you think I am? You think I would inflict that awareness on my daughter? It’s hard enough to live in a land where you don’t belong, but _knowing_ it? Holding conflicting realities and lives in your head, will drive you mad.”

“That’s why you want me to make the hat work, isn’t it?” She asks gently, watching his expression carefully. “You just wanna take Grace home, to your world.”

He looks almost pained for a second as his eyes close tightly, his hands visibly shaking as he perches unsteadily on the table again.

“It’s not that simple,” he says hoarsely. “I need the hat for _after.”_

“After what?” She asks, worried he’s planning on kidnapping the kid and taking off with her, whether he gets his hat or not.

“I have two daughters,” he says, bending over a little. “Hadley, my oldest… I don’t know where she is, _who_ she is.”

“What do you mean?”

“Grace was easy to find, and her new parents are the neighbors I had left her with before the curse. But I can’t find Hadley,” he says, the frustration clear in his voice even as a few more tears fall from his eyes. “I can’t leave without her, I _won’t_. She’s the only thing that kept me sane when I was trapped in Wonderland, when I was trying to get back to Grace.”

“I’m sorry,” she says, taking a small step closer to him and carefully laying her hand on his shoulder. He looks up in surprise, his eyes flickering back and forth across her expression suspiciously. “I know what it’s like to be separated from your kid.”

“Yeah, you do, don’t you?” He raises one hand to rub at his eyes, scrubbing it over his face tiredly. She steps back and turns to look through the telescope again, watching the kid gesturing excitedly as she tells her parents something, and feels Jefferson approach her side.

“It can make you feel like you’re losing your mind,” she says.

“I’m not losing my mind,” he says quickly, and she straightens back up to meet his eyes again. “I’m not crazy. This is real, Emma.”

“Maybe- maybe it is,” she admits, watching his expression go cautiously hopeful.

“You believe?” He asks dubiously.

“If what you say is true,” she says slowly, forcing the words past the lump in her throat as her own eyes tear up. “That woman in the other room is my mother, and I wanna believe that more than anything in the world… So maybe you’re right, maybe I do need to start believing.”

“So, are you going to help me?” He asks genuinely, his expression earnest. “You can get it to work?”

“I can try,” she offers, and he nods eagerly, turning to stride back to the table.

As soon as he’s turned his back she pulls the telescope off its tripod, hitting him with it as he turns back around.

“Crazy son-of-a-bitch,” she whispers, dropping the telescope and pulling her gun out of his waistband, then darts out of the room and closes the door behind her.

She runs down the hallway back to Mary Margaret, quickly undoing the gag again.

“It’s alright,” she says, starting on her bound hands. “I’m gonna get you out of here, it’s gonna be okay.”

“Emma, look out!” Mary Margaret yells, looking towards the doorway.

She pulls her gun as she turns around, but Jefferson is already slamming into her, knocking all three of them to the ground and sending it flying.

She starts crawling towards the gun but he grabs her ankles, pulling her backwards just as fast and grabbing a fistful of her hair. She throws her elbow back and catches him in the jaw, knocking him off of her for a second. One of his hands wraps around her neck before she can crawl away though and she pushes her palm against his chin, forcing his head back at an awkward angle as her other hand grips his collar.

She grunts as he suddenly pulls her to her feet, pushing her backwards into a dresser and grabbing the gun from the floor to level at her. She freezes, panting harshly as he bends to pick up his hat, sitting it crookedly on his head.

She breathes in sharply when she catches sight of his neck, the collar of his shirt open from their struggle and showcasing a thick scar that seems to wrap around his entire neck.

He sees her gaping and smirks briefly.

“Off with his head,” he whispers, the smirk dropping as his expression goes cold.

A flash of movement from the doorway draws her attention away from him, and she has a split-second to recognize August before he’s darting through the door, bodily throwing himself at Jefferson and tackling him to the ground.

She watches the gun sail back through the doorway but before she can try to reach it her path is blocked by Jefferson pushing August off of him. Her brother tries to catch him, but Jefferson is quick, standing up and pushing August into the door jam.

He doubles over with a shout of pain as Mary Margaret hits him with a croquet mallet. He stumbles sideways, turning to look at her, and the woman wastes no time kicking him in the center of his chest - propelling him towards the window.

His bodyweight breaks the glass and carries him through the window with another shout.

“Are you okay?” Mary Margaret asks, breathing heavily. She reaches out and Emma catches her hand briefly. “August?”

“Yeah,” she says as August nods breathlessly in agreement. “We’re alright. Have you been taking boxing lessons without telling me?”

"I have no idea where that came from," Mary Margaret admits, looking wide-eyed and shaken. "Instinct, I guess..."

The three quickly approach the window, looking out cautiously but see only broken glass and the hat, but no Jefferson.

They make their way outside but there’s still no sign of him. He’s gone.

They find her car mostly covered by a tarp, but the yellow wheel-well is still visible enough to be seen from the road, which is how August had found them as he tells it. She and Mary Margaret get into the car and August follows them back to the station on his motorcycle.

Graham beats them back by minutes, getting out of the squad car as they’re pulling in, and they all hurry into the station before anyone spots Mary Margaret.

As soon as they’re all inside Graham abruptly pulls her and Mary Margaret into a hug, a breath shuddering out of him shakily. Mary Margaret returns the hug eagerly, a few tears still falling from her eyes, but it takes Emma a second to get an arm around his back in return.

“Are you both alright?” He asks, his accent thick with concern.

They nod wordlessly.

Emma thinks she might be in shock a bit or something, as she can’t seem to speak yet.

Graham starts to lead Mary Margaret back to her cell, but before Emma can follow them August catches her by the arm, pulling her roughly into another hug. She thinks he’s shaking for a second, but then realizes it’s actually her - that her entire body is faintly trembling.

August’s arms tighten around her and he tucks her head underneath his chin, gently rocking them back and forth where they stand. She manages to get her arms wrapped around his back and finally lets a few tears of her own fall, sinking into her brother’s familiar scent as the absolute shit-show of the day really sinks in for her.


	3. Chapter 3

He and Graham get the girls a bit calmer, with Graham making a quick run to Granny’s to get them both a cup of cinnamon cocoa, even leaving Mary Margaret’s cell open so that she and Emma can curl up together on the bed. August sticks close, watching his little sister lean her head against the other woman’s with a concerningly blank expression, their hands tangled tightly together.

Once Graham is back he coaxes the story out of the two, with Mary Margaret stutteringly telling them about the key to her cell waiting for her and how she had been snatched from the forest, and Emma mechanically fills them in on the rest. She sounds flat and unemotional through the whole thing, though some of her fire comes back when she tells them about the little girl Jefferson had been watching.

He and Graham share a look, both of them frowning in concern, and Graham assures her they’ll find the girl and make sure she’s alright.

The Sheriff has had a dark look on his face since Emma told them Jefferson had been watching the station, watching _her_. August himself had barely managed to restrain the white-hot fury that had shot through him when she’d told them that, so he doesn’t judge the man for the reaction.

He still can't quite believe it.

There's someone in Storybrooke that _knows_ , that remembers their stories and is aware of the curse...

And he's apparently a fucking stalker. Just great.

August could sympathize with wanting his family back, he had the same crushing desire every time he saw his father in town, but that was the extent of his sympathy for the man.

Mostly he just wanted Graham to shoot him.

“Emma?” He calls gently, crouching in front of her and slipping his hand into hers. Mary Margaret seemed to be processing the situation healthily enough, crying and accepting comfort and talking about it, but Emma has just shut down - the same way she always has when she’s struggling to cope with something. “You’re both safe, okay? Talk to me, Em.”

She reluctantly meets his eyes, her own glassy with stubbornly unshed tears.

“Do you remember that one family I was placed with when I was twelve?” She asks suddenly, still looking a little _not_ -present, but meeting his eyes with a frown. “It was just after you aged-out, before Ingrid.”

“What?” He asks, confused about the shift in topics for a second until he realizes what she’s talking about and glances towards Mary Margaret, surprised Emma was talking about this in front of other people. “Um, yeah… Yeah, I remember. Pretty sure that took like twenty years off my life.”

Mary Margaret is frowning a bit in confusion but seems to sense the seriousness of the sudden topic change, and August can see Graham from the corner of his eye, lingering by the bars and listening unobtrusively.

“That was the first time I ever lost someone like that,” she says almost absentmindedly, her eyes dropping towards the crease of her arm to stare at the little sun tattooed there and he thinks maybe that’s it, but then she takes a shaky breath and whispers, “Jefferson reminded me of him.”

He can still feel an echo of the bone-deep _terror_ he had felt that day, when the car had raced out of the driveway and he’d seen her inside it, when he saw the car sinking in the river scant minutes later.

In the present he squeezes Emma’s hand ruthlessly, but she grips his just as hard.

“He’s dead Emma,” he tries to reassure her, swallowing the bile that tries to rise in his throat. “Jefferson isn’t him, and you’re not a kid anymore. Neither of them can hurt you.”

He’ll kill Jefferson himself if he ever tries to hurt her.

She turns suddenly to face Mary Margaret, clearly startling the woman a little with attention.

“I won’t lose anyone else. I _cannot_ lose my family,” she says suddenly, a fiery determination in her watery eyes. “I’m going to get you out of here Mary Margaret, I _swear_.”

“Family?” Mary Margaret repeats, a warm smile blooming across her face as Emma’s eyes go wide, clearly just realizing she had said that, but Mary Margaret just pulls her into a hug.

He leaves Emma in Graham’s care, telling him that he’s gonna go to the loft and take some clothes back to his room at Granny’s, so she can stay there tonight instead of being alone. The Sheriff nods, sending him off with a squeeze to the shoulder.

He _does_ drop off some of Emma’s clothes at his room, but it only takes maybe ten minutes and then he’s speeding off down the back roads he had just been searching for his sister on.

He parks on the side of the road and walks the rest of the way to the house. The front door is not only unlocked still, but also slightly ajar, which it definitely hadn’t been when they left.

 _Good_ , he thinks. _He’s not going to make me track him down._

He steps quietly into the house, closing the door behind him and then following the sounds of rummaging up the stairs. He finds the man in a bedroom, his back to the door as he digs through the drawer of a dresser.

He quickly and quietly steps up behind him, pointedly clearing his throat, and then punching him solidly across the jaw when he whirls around. It’s satisfying to see him stumble to the ground, catching himself hard with his elbow.

August steps back and forces himself to take a deep breath, pushing down some of his anger so he can actually do what he came here for.

“It’s Jefferson, right?” He asks lightly, watching the man push himself up, though he wisely decides to stay sitting against the dresser. There’s a smear of blood on his chin from where he seems to have bitten his lip, and the sight makes him feel just a smidge calmer. “That was for my sister.”

“Sister?” He asks, his expression bewildered. “The King and Queen didn’t have any other kids.”

“You don’t have to be blood to be family,” he says curtly, ignoring the way the man’s eyes go wide. “This is a warning; stay the fuck away from Emma, or I’ll make you wish you had stayed in Wonderland.”

He turns on his heel and leaves, ignoring the hatter yelling behind him.

“You _know_ , you remember!”

He walks out the front door and pointedly slams it shut behind him, heading back to his bike so he can get back to Emma.

He can’t help but think her encounter with Jefferson is gonna make getting her to believe in the curse even harder now, and he lets out an annoyed sigh as he starts his bike up.

 _Fucking Mad Hatter_.

**Author's Note:**

> Hattie is an OC I made for one of my Descendants works and I got attached to her, so I decided "why not?" and threw her into this world too lmao. Hopefully you like her as much as I do, she's very fun~ ♥
> 
> I hope you enjoyed! Please feel free to leave a comment, I always reply and they make my week! ^^  
> You can find me on tumblr at [ElvhenWitch](http://www.elvhenwitch.tumblr.com) ♥ and twitter at [Elfbich](https://twitter.com/elfbich)


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